


Old Enough

by chooken



Category: Westlife
Genre: Anal Sex, Arguing, Boys In Love, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, Growing Old Together, Long-Term Relationship(s), M/M, Sulking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-14
Updated: 2018-07-14
Packaged: 2019-06-10 03:31:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15282639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chooken/pseuds/chooken
Summary: Mark makes a comment about Nicky's age.Nicky clearly overreacts.





	Old Enough

“Ex... excuse me?”

“I was just saying.” Mark realises what he's just said, judging from the slight fall of his face under Nicky's glare. “I mean... you're doing quite well, aren't you? Comparatively speaking.” There's pink edging into his cheeks. “It was a compliment.”

“Fucking _was_ it?” Nicky's fists clench. It's a beautiful day. The sitting room bathed in a silvery mid-summer light. They'd been having rather a lovely afternoon, draped about. Nicky on his phone and Mark with a magazine in his lap that he's picked up from some flight or other. A moment of sweet fuck all amongst the madness.

Then he'd gone to try on his uniform for the Soccer Aid thing coming up, and Mark had decided to comment.

“For _my age?_ ” Nicky repeats. “What age is that?”

“I'm just saying. You're doing this football thing and I think it's cool. You know. That you're still doing that stuff. There's not many forty year olds-”

“Thirty-nine,” Nicky snaps automatically. “And what do you do? You get winded climbing the stairs.” Now it's Mark's turn to raise an eyebrow, though he doesn't comment. Nicky is still glaring. “Anyway, Robbie Williams is forty-four.” It's not really relevant. He feels hotly desperate, wishes he didn't while Mark sighs and looks back at his magazine. “I'm thirty-nine,” he snaps again. “You're only a year younger than me.”

“Almost two.” There's a cheeky glint in Mark's eyes when he looks back up again. “Just like you're almost forty.”

“I'm not...” He is though. Not that it matters. Age is just a number. It's how you feel, and he doesn't feel...

“It's fine. It happens to all of us,” Mark says idly. “I go on a decent run and it hurts for a week.” He licks his thumb to turn the page. “Remember when we were young, though? Think we each came four times in one night and now two seems out of the question most days.” He hmms. Taps the glossy picture in front of him. “What you think of this coat? I've been looking for a new one.”

“It's... yeah, it's nice,” Nicky replies, slightly off-kilter. “Sorry to disappoint you,” he grumbles. “If you want a teenager s'pose you can go out and find one that'll go off every five seconds.”

“Didn't say that.” Mark turns the page again. “I love _you_ , eejit. We'll be old and wrinkly and lose our hair and get fat and it'll be grand.”

“I'm not losing my hair,” he blurts. Mark looks up again, that eyebrow raised. “I'm not.” He touches the style he's been carefully cultivating for a good few years now, scowling when he feels the tease of smooth skin under the floppy quiff.

“It's fine, I love you anyway.”

“Well I love _you_ even though you're old and fat and useless and can't climb the stairs,” Nicky retorts. Mark purses his lips.

“Good,” he says finally. Now he looks annoyed, and as much as Nicky knows he's just been expertly wound up he feels a flush of shame for what he's said. “I love you even though you're fucking excellent for your age and I can't wait to grow old with you.” He throws down the magazine. Groans slightly as he heaves himself off the sofa. Nicky fights the urge to comment, mostly because Mark's clearly offended and he knows he's fucked up. “I'll go find that teenager, shall I? Maybe they'll be more mature.”

And Mark strops off, feet a stomp on the stairs.

The bedroom door slams shut.

The magazine is still on the sofa cushion. Nicky sinks down beside it, head in his hands. It's a beautiful day, silver mid-afternoon light brightening the sitting room, dust motes swirling in its wake. A day to enjoy off together, draped around the living room and enjoying a rare moment of nothingness and connection.

The nothingness is certainly there.

He'll wait, he decides. There's no point going up yet. Mark will be in a sulk, won't want to talk yet. Nicky knows that better than he knows himself. There's no use barging in until he gets his thoughts in order, despite it giving him more ammunition in reply. Not that Mark's like that. He'll play the wind-up, but he isn't petty. Is better than Nicky like that, where he can breathe out and let things go. Nicky's always been able to talk to him.

Fuck, he can't wait to grow old with Mark.

Half an hour and an unseeing flick through the magazine later he begins to climb the stairs. There's a time-sensitive aspect to this. Go up and apologise before Mark can come down and do the same. He needs to be sorry first. He's an adult, dammit.

The door makes a soft creak as he edges it open.

“So... hey.” Mark is turned away, pretending to be asleep. He isn't, clearly. Partly because he's had three coffees in the last two hours. Partly because Nicky just _knows_ after twenty fucking years of experience. “Um.”

Mark is still, and silent, curled up in his tracksuit bottoms and t-shirt on top of the duvet.

“You look pretty good for your age,” he jokes. Mark doesn't move. “I mean, as far as inappropriate toyboys go, you've always been my favourite.” He rounds the bed to sit down in front of Mark, just above his knees where there's room on the edge of the mattress. One eye cracks open for half a second, then closes hurriedly. Nicky smirks. “Suppose there's benefits to being older. You know. Wiser. More mature. I remember when I was your age and throwing tantrums and storming off to sulk in my room. Used to be ticklish too.”

Mark tenses, curling in a little on himself. Nicky lets his hand rest on a stiff waist that jumps under his touch.

“M'not ticklish.”

“Course not. You're much too old for that,” Nicky teases gently. Mark snorts and buries his face in the pillow.

“Not having a tantrum.” It's muffled.

“Course you're not. You're having a nap. It's what old people do.” Nicky stands, begins to shuck off his uniform, and rounds the bed to climb in on the other side. “Sounds pretty good, actually. The perks of the elderly.” He shuffles under the duvet, rolling close to spoon around Mark, who's still on top of it. It'll do, at least. “Lots of perks. Sponge-baths, discounts at the movies. Pull our trousers up to our armpits.” Mark giggles. Nicky grins.

“Can we get one of those walkers with a seat?”

“One each. We'll race around the back garden and whoever wins gets all the pills. And I'll still fancy the life out of you so I'll probably share when I win.”

“Oh. Cheers.” Mark rolls grudgingly over, and they wrestle the duvet around until it's over both of them. Mark's eyes reflect the afternoon sun when they open. As intense a blue as they've ever been, even with a few more wrinkles. Nicky traces them with his fingertip, each one a diary entry of half a life together. “I'm getting old and fat, aren't I?”

“Yeah, but I'm going bald and my knees hurt when it rains.” Nicky smiles. “Be forty soon.”

“That's not that old.”

“Nope. Still got at least forty years left of pestering you.”

“I hope so,” Mark sighs. They grin at each other, a shared moment of agreement that if there's something worth arguing over, this isn't it. “You'll run rings around Robbie Williams.”

“Clearly,” Nicky chuckles. “You've gotten better as you've gotten older, anyway. Remember when you were this shy kid and I didn't know what the hell to make of you. Thought you were going to shrink into a ball every time I spoke to you.”

“I was trying to hide my erection,” Mark laughs. “Why do you think I started wearing long coats everywhere?”

“Wardrobe?”

“That too.” Nicky traces his cheek again. A strong hand settles on his waist pulling him closer. Pressed together. Mark as soft and warm and all-encompassing as he's always been. Nicky sinks into him. Melts. Coaxes him into a breathy kiss. The taste he's been savouring two decades. Hand trailing down his arse and back up, just fingertips that tickle through his boxers.

“Need your long coat?” Nicky teases, when he feels pressure against him. Mark snorts.

“Not trying to hide it any more.” A gentle nibble pecks at his nose. Nicky shivers.

“I've got somewhere you can hide it.”

“That so?” Nicky's already helping him out of his clothes under the covers. Kicks them back to give him more room when they're done and rolls on top, looking down at his naked lover, linking their fingers together as he does. “Okay?”

“Yeah.” Smooths his hand over a soft belly, up slight love handles. Thumbs over a nipple that hardens against his touch. “Pretty good for your age.”

“Yeah.” Mark cups his cheek. Strokes up, pushing back the flop of hair that's fallen over Nicky's forehead. When Nicky leans forward he gets a kiss on the hairline that has definitely _not_ shifted backwards in the last few years. “Pretty good,” it mumbles against his skin. Nicky sighs happily. Nuzzles Mark's jaw as his underwear's shifted down and hands cup his arse, spreading him open. Two fingers stroking down, spreading him more and he reaches across for the lube, sat on the side-table from the night before.

The preparation is quick. Then Mark's in, seated gently inside him until they're bottomed out, slotted together like lock and key.

“This never gets old,” Nicky groans. Mark licks his lips in reply. Tilts. Nicky rests a hand on his chest, lips parting and jaw slackening under the pressure that holds to him. It's perfection. Not fucking, just _there_. Here. He and Mark and the embarrassing squelch of separating bodies when he lifts slightly and resettles, both of them laughing.

“Bet I can go more than once,” Mark teases.

“Bet I can too,” Nicky agrees. “Three times?”

“Jesus, Nicky, I'm not twenty. I'll give meself a hernia.”

“Old man,” Nicky retorts. Mark's hips roll a warning shot that makes him growl.

It's slow. Smooth. Mark taking him in something less a fuck and more a moving embrace, Nicky leaned forward and Mark's knees bent up and breathing each other's air. A snog that feels endless until he feels Mark shiver and tense and the thick blurt of heat that announces he's come. Emptied then filled again with thick fingers that take over. That play every note until Nicky shudders. Shudders again and tenses a cry. Thumb teasing his rim and two digits stroking through the mess inside him and he goes grinding himself into Mark's stomach, both arms locked tight around shoulders slicked with sweat.

“Mm,” Nicky sighs, when Mark finally untangles them and climbs out of bed. “Again?”

“In a minute.” He comes back with a facecloth. Sits down beside Nicky and begins to mop up the mess between them, rolls Nicky over when he's done to get at the trickling flood starting to make its way down his crack and the back of his thighs. It's gentle. More intimate than a fuck. Careful connection that ends with a soft kiss on his left arse-cheek. Nicky smiles into his crossed arms.

“Love you.”

“Love you too.” Mark hesitates. “You're not having a nap, are you?”

“Just enjoying my sponge-bath.” Mark lets out a surprised cackle that makes Nicky laugh too. “Race around the garden?”

“Later.” The cloth is tossed aside. Mark climbs up to settle on top of him. Heavy and perfect. A kiss bites behind his ear. “We'll recover for a bit, and then I'll make you come again,” he promises.

“Recover?” Nicky scoffs, though he's starting to drift and doesn't want to admit it. “Old man.”

“Yeah,” Mark agrees. “Not bad for my age.”

 


End file.
